Picking the Greens

Introduction

The heart of the awakened lion dance, as the lion leaps up to eat a hanging lettuce

Picking the greens is the central set piece of the Guangdong awakened lion dance, which the national heritage listing calls its very essence. The awakened lion is a southern lion said to descend from the Tang court lion dance; it appeared in Nanhai in Guangdong in the Ming and is now danced across Guangdong, Guangxi and Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. As the gongs and drums strike up, a smiling big-headed Buddha with a palm-leaf fan leads the lion on. The greens are usually a head of lettuce, whose Cantonese name sounds like making money, so homes and shops hang it with a red packet over the door or from the ceiling. In the ground version the lion simply leaps up and eats it, while the high version for big shows calls for stools and chairs, shoulder stands or climbing bamboo poles. The routine runs through an opening, development, turn and close, which gives it drama and a story, and it has given rise to many variant routines.